Sucker rod scrapers are attached to reciprocating sucker rods in order that paraffin wax may be scraped from well tubing as the sucker rod reciprocally moves up and down. The form of scraper in most common usage consists of a plurality of parallel vanes with channels for the flow of fluids between the vanes. The problem with these scrapers is that over prolonged usage the vanes moving up and down wear grooves in the well tubing.
Helical scrapers have been used in an effort to avoid wear grooves. The theory behind helical scrapers is that they provide even wear around the 360 degree inner circumference of the well tubing and do a better job of cleaning paraffin wax from the well tubing. An example of a helical scraper is U.S. Pat. No. 4,532,988 which issued in 1985. One problem with such helical scrapers is that they constrict the flow of fluids up the well tubing. Another problem with such helical scrapers is that the flow of fluids along the 360 helical flight of the scraper tends to exert a torsional force upon the sucker rod.